I went and had a look at this last week on one of the open days, seeing as i was in the area at the time. It's a massive building for that sort of money, so there's lots of options subject to planning consent.
There's a few catches I could see with it:
- It's in between a pub and another commercial type property, but i'm sure that wouldn't be too much of a problem in regards to converting to residential.
- It's located in a flood plain, as the River Great Ouse runs along the bottom of the grassed area at the end of the plot. This could create a few problems with insurance, but again I don't think it can't be overcome. There's plenty of other residential properties in the same area, so someone will insure it. Might have to factor this in when working out an offer price for it though.
- The side that overlooks the pub car park must have some of overlooking restriction to the neighbouring property on it because the windows are so small. This will affect the layout of any designs for developing it, see photo here:
I'm expecting this to sell for well above the £250k asking price, and if it doesn't then i might have to grab it myself. It's a lot of building for a low guide price, and December can be a good month for picking up a bargain while everyone else is thinking about Christmas.
My initial thought was to turn this into high end bedsits for working professionals. It's a bit far from Bedford town centre to walk it, but there's a bus route right near the property. I also think you could make more of the riverside location and cut the trees back to expose the view, making a feature out of it. That could be a real selling point in the summer!
